From October 16-19, 1813, Leipzig was the site of the Battle of the Nations. The unified armed forces of Russia, Prussia, Austria and Sweden prevailed in a decisive victory over Napoleon and his allies on German soil. In the end, 600,000 soldiers from over twenty countries took part in the battle, 100,000 were killed or wounded, and a typhus epidemic broke out in Leipzig, killing 10% of the population. One year after the devastating battle, the poet Ernst Moritz Arndt had the idea of creating a memorial to honour the fallen. In 1894, Leipzig architect Clemens Thieme founded the German Patriot's Association, with the goal of collecting donations for the memorial. By 1898, sufficient funds had been raised to lay the cornerstone. In 1913, the Monument to the Battle of the Nations was dedicated as a national monument.